Central hospitals are not overloaded when treating serious illnesses

"There are incurable diseases, fatal diseases, and cancers that district and provincial hospitals cannot treat. So why not transfer them directly to higher-level hospitals?" Deputy Minister of Health Do Xuan Tuyen said at a press conference announcing the President's order on laws, including the Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Law on Health Insurance.

Under the new law passed by the National Assembly in late November, health insurance participants with serious illnesses requiring surgery or high-tech procedures can go to any hospital regardless of where they initially registered and will be reimbursed 100% of the costs. The list of serious illnesses and complex procedures will be issued by the Minister of Health.

The 100% health insurance benefit will also apply to people who receive emergency care at all medical facilities; ethnic minorities and poor households living in difficult areas; people who receive medical examination and treatment at primary health facilities and inpatients at specialized facilities, even before January 1, 2025, are still identified as district-level.

Deputy Minister Do Xuan Tuyen said this regulation is necessary because currently, health insurance participants often have to register at primary health facilities such as district hospitals, then transfer to provincial hospitals and then continue to the central level. This wastes a lot of patients' time, while many diseases need to be transferred immediately.

Previously, health insurance examination and treatment were based on administrative boundaries, leading to a situation where people who were sick were only a few dozen meters from the hospital but still had to register at the right facility dozens of kilometers away. Some people went on business trips from the North to the South, and only if they had an emergency would they be covered by health insurance, but if they had a common illness, they would not be covered. Students registered for initial medical examination and treatment at their place of study, but had to pay when they returned home for examination.

"These are very inappropriate issues, so it is necessary to amend regulations to create conditions for people to access the best and most convenient medical services," said Mr. Tuyen.

The Deputy Minister also emphasized that with the new law, the situation of overload at Central hospitals will not occur, because the Ministry of Health will design technical barriers. At the same time, lower-level hospitals are being encouraged to invest in equipment to attract patients. The Ministry of Health is developing regulations on cases of transfer without a referral letter, expected to be applied from January 1, 2025.

Regarding the purchase of prescription drugs online, Mr. Tuyen said that if there is sufficient infrastructure and synchronous implementation, this will be very convenient for people. However, he emphasized that protecting people's health is the top priority. If not strictly managed, there may be situations where someone else's prescription is borrowed to buy medicine.

"Currently, the information technology system in Vietnam is not yet synchronized, so it is not possible to apply the online sale of prescription drugs," said Mr. Tuyen, saying that there needs to be a solution so that each prescription is only valid for one use and cannot be transferred to another person. The health sector will consider selling prescription drugs online in the future and this issue will be mentioned when amending the Pharmacy Law.